Oshawa passes 1.44-per cent tax hike

Oshawa residents will pay another $60 in taxes on average home

Oshawa City Hall

OSHAWA -- After a full day of deliberations, Oshawa councillors were able to modestly trim the budget and pass a 1.44-per cent tax increase for 2014.

This represents a $28.83 increase for the average Oshawa home, which is assessed at $290,000. Coupled with the Regional increase of 1.5 per cent and no increase on the education portion of property tax bills, Oshawa residents can expect to see a total tax increase of 1.19 per cent on their property tax bill this year, or $59.98 on the average home. Oshawa pays less on the Regional bill than most other Durham municipalities because garbage is collected locally.

Councillors debated the budget on Feb. 14 and cut a total of $755,900. The 2014 tax increase will bring an additional $1.6 million in revenue to the City.

The biggest savings came from gapping which occurs when an employees leave the City or retire and they’re not immediately replaced.

The City had $700,000 in savings through gapping and council chose to spend $200,000 on a succession planning project that may allow other positions to be consolidated and $25,000 on the investigation into flooding in the Trowbridge Drive community. The remaining $475,000 was cut from the budget.

City treasurer Nicole Pincombe said the vacant positions are all under review to determine whether they need to be filled, changed or left vacant.

Although a nominal amount, the most hotly debated issue related to council expenses and the debate grew particularly acrimonious with councillors talking over each other.

It started when Coun. John Aker proposed cutting each councillor’s expenses by $500 to $1,000 per year. He pointed out that the expense line was $2,300 at the beginning of the council term and even at the 2013 rate of $1,500 councillors weren’t using all of it.

“This is just for today to show the good citizens of the community we are sincere about trying to keep the tax rate as low as possible,” he said.

But Coun. Tito-Dante Marimpietri said his colleague’s motion was about optics and moved a motion to reduce expenses to zero and for an independent audit of the mayor’s office expenses.

Councillors ultimately voted to opt for an internal audit instead of an external one. Coun. Aker said he cast his vote against an external audit because the cost would negate the savings from reducing councillor expenses.

The mayor’s office budget in 2014 is $292,100. Of that $277,200 went to salaries for the mayor and his two staff members, including his executive assistant.

Coun. Marimpietri also presented a motion to eliminate the executive assistant position. That motion failed.

In an interview subsequent to the meeting, Mayor Henry said the position isn’t new to his term and said the executive assistant’s job is to keep the office running when the mayor is away at community events or meetings at the Region or in other communities.

“You can imagine the number of complaints that come in on a day like today, snowplowing, sidewalks,” he said on a snowy Monday afternoon.

He said he also welcomed the audit of his office expenses.

Additions to the budget included $15,000 for an e-bike communication strategy. After consulting with the community earlier this year, Oshawa moved to ban e-bikes from sidewalks and the money will go towards educating the public about the change as well as the safe use of e-bikes on trails.

Council also approved additional funding for two external agencies, Parkwood and the Oshawa Senior Citizens Centre. Oshawa will put aside $75,000 for the Parkwood greenhouse restoration. The money will be released when the national historic site raises matching funds from other government agencies or from donors. The funds are in addition to the City’s $325,000 operating grant to Parkwood.

Parkwood had initially asked the City commit $75,000 per year over four years towards the $900,000 rehabilitation of six greenhouses.

Meanwhile, the City is also contributing $49,500 to the OSCC for the development of an annual fundraising campaign which is in addition to the organization’s $1.48-million grant for the year from the City.

Council also chose to defer three capital projects: $50,000 for a Union Cemetery operation plan; $43,600 in repairs to the Union Cemetery mausoleum; and an $87,000 roof replacement for the squash courts at the Civic.

Coun. Nester Pidwerbecki asked questions about the road leading to Gemini Gymnastics at the airport lands. A $40,000 repair was part of the capital budget. City staff also committed to looking at improving the parking area near the 420 Wing site which Coun. Pidwerbecki said looked like “a terrible piece of pasture.”

Reactions to the budget depended on where councillors sit on the political divide.

“This budget is unacceptable because it’s a contrived, political budget to go into an election and say we got you a lower tax rate,” said Coun. Marimpietri, who voted against the budget with Coun. Bruce Wood and Coun. John Neal.

Meanwhile the mayor said he believed the budget was respectful to taxpayers and also ensured that the City had put money aside for contract negotiations and made contributions to reserves.

“This budget is a good budget for today and it allows us to be forward thinking to the future and the needs of this community,” said Mayor Henry. “It helps ensure there’s long-term financial sustainability in the City.”

Reporter Reka Szekely covers the City of Oshawa for Metroland Media Group’s Durham Region Division. Reka's social media column appears every other week. Contact her on Facebook, Twitter (@rszekely)

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(1) Comment

By Commen Sence|FEBRUARY 21, 2014 08:19 AM

That said I will vote " No " for Tito , John N and Bruce W on the next election ...just being consistent with those guys who always vote " No ".